Home Opens To Keep Children Safe And Families Together

October 17, 1994|By BATTINTO BATTS JR. Staff Writer

FORT LAUDERDALE — Broward County's abused children and their families soon will have a new place to come for help.

On Sunday, the I. Lorraine Thomas Children's Emergency Home and Family Support Center, at 401 NE Fourth St., was dedicated. When it opens on Nov. 15, the home will be a 24-hour free emergency shelter for children.

"We are all drawn here by our commitment and love for the pure innocence of children," said John W. Szerdi, chairman of the board for the Intracoastal Division of the Children's Home Society. The society will staff and manage the home.

Abused children who are removed from their families by the state department of Health and Rehabilitative Services will be taken to the two-story pink and white home, Szerdi said.

The home's first floor is filled with bright bedrooms for 30 children, a dining area, infirmary and play areas.

The second floor has offices where staff members will counsel parents. While the parents receive counseling to help reunite their family, the children will have a safe place to stay.

"We want to become family centered," said C. Jay Rader, executive director of the Intracoastal Division. "When a child comes to us, we want to find out what happened in the family. Our focus is reunification."

Fund raising for the $2.5 million home began five years ago. It is named after I. Lorraine Thomas, wife of Wendy's Restaurant founder Dave Thomas.

The Thomases, who donated $500,000 to the project, are the home's largest private benefactors.

"Everyone that worked on this deserves a pat on the back and a kiss on the cheek," Lorraine Thomas said. "It took all of you to make this happen."

The Children's Home Society of Florida was founded in 1902 in Jacksonville to care for abandoned children. The society's Intracoastal Division was founded in 1967 to help meet Broward's need for children's services.

The division is opening the Thomas home, its first children's home, to help the growing number of abused children, Rader said.